New Delhi (Mizzima) – The Burmese Prime Minister Thein Sein, currently in New York to attend the 64th General Assembly of the United Nations, will meet US Senator James Webb, a strong advocate of engagement with the regime, on Monday.
Webb’s office said, the Virginia Senator has accepted an invitation by the UN Under-Secretary-General Ambassador Joseph Verner Reed to meet the Burmese Prime Minister on Monday in New York.
“I appreciate Ambassador Reed’s initiative in arranging this meeting, and I look forward to continuing the dialogue with Prime Minister Tein Shein that was begun last month,” Webb said in a statement issued by his office.
Webb last week also met Burmese Foreign Minister Nyan Win, who is visiting Washington from New York, where he is attending the UNGA, and discussed U.S.-Burma relations.
Thein Sein, who will be delivering a speech at the General Assembly on Monday, is the senior most Burmese official to attend the UNGA in 14 years. The last time it was the Burmese Vice-Senior General Maung Aye, who attended the UNGA in 1995.
Webb, who is chairman of the East Asia and Pacific Affairs Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, has led an effort in Congress to comprehensively evaluate the effectiveness of U.S. policy towards Burma, including the U.S.-imposed economic sanctions that have not been matched by other countries.
The Democrat Senator, during his visit to Burma as part of the five-country visit to Southeast Asia, met the Burmese junta supremo Senior General Than Shwe and detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Webb on Wednesday will hold a comprehensive hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to examine Burma’s current economic and political situation and to seek testimony regarding that country’s long history of internal turmoil and ethnic conflicts.
“The hearing will further evaluate U.S. policy towards Burma, including U.S. sanctions; will discuss what role the United States can and should play in promoting democratic reform in Burma; and hear testimony on how to frame a new direction for U.S.-Burma relations,” the statement said.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said, the new US policy on Burma would include direct engagement with the Burmese military regime, while maintaining the previous policy’s economic sanctions, which observers call using both “carrot and stick”.
